Book of the Jewel Worm

XIII.

Dear Urze: the ventriloquism of our Khandro is truly naughty.

And yet you have met my mother,

I regret to submit

to both you and Marie,

including her full polyphony

that was first directed at me while still a boy

of four, thought to be dying of measles. That afternoon

I met the many mother masks of that sickness

and the Khandro of Lux

was, I suspect, their boss.

Pretend this is some orange postcard from Marseilles.

My love to you both.

I'll write more in a few days. I'm tenting on the Plain of Jars

until Thursday. Absolute, sincerest . . . Your uncle.

XIV.

will leak even into my contaminant-army

tent. It's affected my sight, along with those months

of darkness in Tibet. Every time a blue pearl

lodged in my neck

it was another adjustment

in the prescription for the contacts. The khandro was right

about the chelates, they assist the mother with pain

from the first contraction through delivery

while never reaching the fetus. And there's still the right level

of distress in the birth channel.

That your mother carried you at all

was a miracle. That generation of women

was completely taken up with the Wyndings

on Saturn. The rare woman who carried, aborted in the first term.

It was like a religion.

The number of white mills for both obstetrics and aging

increased a thousand fold on earth alone.

It lasted for ten years. Your mother's Laotion

mendicancy made all the difference. You do realize,

we were all in love with her. It was, she has told you,

Crow Woman's great-grandchild who was mid-wife to you both.

Her name was Ruth Psalter and it puzzled people

that she agreed to visit your birth

for in the past she had attended exclusively the incarnate tulkus.

And even then, mostly the religious ones,

almost never the artistic. The line

that runs from Mozart to Jimi Hendrix to the great Nigerian, Ben Ahlen—

she would not assist that family.

Oslo and I joked

that your father could have been a forest mendicant.

But, of course, you have his DNA tags, all many millions of them.

This is my last night in this fucking tent. I don't dare

to even bring beer out here. I do get thirsty.

Alfred has come along on this trip

and they still pay him to be my research assistant. He

has been asleep for hours, so I dare not take my tiny hammers

to these yellow volcanic coffins

that we gathered off the plain. They're about the size

of ostrich eggs. One in a hundred will contain a script or artifact.

I have one with a pink quartz streak in it

whose specific density is way off. When the Keet Sleet sealed it up again

they used a decorative resin the color of this quartz. I'll wait

till morning and open it with Alfred. My love. Your uncle.

XV.

Dear Urze: these volcanic cinders that I collect

sometimes contain gold ribbon

with indecipherable dakini script. Even though

not a single Keet Sleet man or woman

has lived in the time of our recorded history

I still feel great misgivings when opening these caskets.

They come

in two classifications, Geks and Dzas.

The Gek is just a vapor of elation in the brain

seconds after the cinder is opened.

The Dzas are scary and contain, according to legend,

gold and platinum strips

with cursive glyphs. The Dzas

                        the niece was stopped

                        at the last of the cholera checkpoints.

They will delay her like the aunt.

                        In the anterior margins of the sea

                        there are the many spheres

                        halved by hairs.

                       One has hazel eyes

and the aunt has red hair. Neither cries.

Show this to Marie. Tell her I joked about it

being worthy of André Gide. Don't be alarmed

by the reference to quarantine.

There is some psychic spontaneity to the Dzas—an odd,

self-fulfilling filter to the previous night's sleep. I had

dreamt of your dead aunt.

This probably accounts for the whole script. Don't forget

that the thing least likely to be surmounted, IS!

Your uncle. Ekajati.

XVI.

Dear Marie: it's your mother-in-law here again

and I'm very sorry for that last stockgram.

My husband always said

I was an addict to inflection. I must advise you though

to distance yourself from my son

who drinks and gambles with rough-necks

in the Maximillian Shacks. The son-of-a-bitch, pardon

this first person authority, would tell you

that I am not myself

and that this is another script

originating from the dark throat of Cygnus. Well, if he's so smart

why hasn't he paused to eschew

some obvious news, which is

that I died of a violent pneumonia

a week following

my beloved Samuel's passing. Let's shelter

Paul from this, he'd just mistake it for more of our fictive singing.

And after all we are not cruel. What else

is he confused about?

The cough did not originate with the mines.

It is caused by the ether

he's releasing from the Geks. Further

the last Golden Dza that he split

is sacred to several hundred dakinis in the Assembly. He's lucky

when he was dying of thirst. Urze must see

what a complete jerk her uncle is?

You know, his wife

scripted right into the arms of a Balinese gentleman

and is utterly thankful for the attraction.

What haven't I told you— he is the government,

folded into governments. Twice already in his meager life

he's worked as an agent for Zurich.

The last time he was on Earth

he accepted payments of gold and rice

from Beijing and Nice. And there was an exchange

originating in extant-Canada. A boy

was the payment then . . .

He no longer knows who he is, who he

works for. But it is cerainly not our Urze-la!

He'll be shocked to hear of his mother's death.

Tell him that maybe later

when I'm in a more generous costumery,

I'll hold his hand, play poker with him—

I'll even weed his arboretum. Tell him

I am glad he doesn't fear me any more. I'm the Khandro.

Post Script: Oh,

he will live. The breath of the Geks

is not lethal.

He must not think of the Keet Sleet

as dead. His mother lived, didn't she,

until the page-turner began to rise

from her polished black bench, leaning forward

to 'vetched ice' . . . stunned,

but not dead. What does he think the weirding is?

XVII.

Dear Urze: you shouldn't worry about me.

The last cable to Marie

came here as well. No, any speech she makes

that might reach you will be truthful. So my mother

has been dead since the New Year.

The flares from the sun

were canceling stockgrams then by the hundreds,

but registering

half of them as delivered. Someone must have written?

Those large ellipses of the sun would make an excellent

transport for a Dza's turquoise worm.

It could easily fly

and then plough and bevel

the volcanic sediment. I tend to think though

that they are all Keet Sleet artifacts.

The Khandro sure is touchy about them?

The last thing she said regarding 'the weirding'

is curious. It seems these communications

are a collaboration between the Bardo splendors

of the dead and a transmitting dakini.

This means while we're eating her tripe

on Earth or Mars

she could literally be sampling cucumber sandwiches

and lemonade with my mother in a Paradise.

I do know you shouldn't worry—

she won't harm me

for they won't tolerate anything disturbing you. And

there's a Minyak compact of non-violence

ruling all the assemblies, except the Shö—

(if, in truth, any of them are still vital.)

I dreamt last night

of a late twentieth century barbarian poet.

He was French-Canadian, Monsieur Nedperse,

and he read to me from Milton

while eating a whole chicken. He sat in half-light,

a giant with a white beard—he'd recite,

lick his fingers and then recite some more.

Before leaving, he smiled broadly

and I saw then across his forehead

my mother rowing out on her pond

among greenly collared lilies.

She was wearing a straw hat and canvas shoes.

The giant pronouncing her,

not the daughter of black perpendiculars,

but the watercolorist of fat smacks.

Then I woke up.

Urze-la, don't worry about the dead.

Remember it's a long continuous thread.

And nothing happens. Love. Uncle.

Post Script: Oh,

of course I work for governments. It's romantic

compared to the Corporate Trust, IBM & DEEDS, or

Sears Roebuck. And the boy from Quebec

is just my assistant, Alfred.

This dakini is infuriating. Woe

is me— travail

& blue, boo-hoo. She thinks I'm pinko?

By the way, don't attempt a phaxx & lading

until Tuesday, there are

expanding storms of invisible paraffins

nearing the Jet of Hope—

                                                          Oh, I forgot,

yes these postscripts break her concentration—

fiendish, isn't it?

XVIII.

—phaxx without lading.

THE OLD WOMEN CARRY SACKS OF RUE WITH DRIED ORANGES

DOWN FROM THE SNOW MOUNTAIN OF APHU

TO THE BURNING FIELDS

WHERE LIKE THE WHITE ROSARY OF VAIN REPETITIONS

LARKS ARE RISING FROM THE TIMOTHY

OF AN EARLIER LIFE. DRESSED IN A YELLOW RAG

THE COUNTESS OF EXCRÉMARGE

PASSES US STANDING IN A WAGON. HER SHADOW

THOUGH, IS BATHING IN MOONLIGHT ON A ROOFTOP

IN JERUSALEM. THE SAID, SIMPLE METRICS

OF A TIRED SEPTENARY. WE PARADE WITH HER

INTO THE SOFT AND VIOLENT CHAMBERS

OF AN EARLY POLAND. A GREAT WILDERNESS

OF BREAKING SNOW

AND SOFT LIGHTS OF A FRIDAY NIGHT SUPPER

WILL NOT SAVE THEM, THE MAD OZIAS TOLD US SO . . .

IN THE STARVELING WINTER

THEY SHOULD TAKE YOUR BOOK AND BURN IT,

PUTTING THE ASHES ON THEIR CHILDREN'S FACES.

THE SPECTER OF LOS

ZAZAZAZAZAZAZA ∞

IS DREAMING OF THE HORSES IN WHITE WATER AGAIN.

ONE STANDS AND EATS THE SLAMON. THE KALF IS TWENTY.

ELIAKIM AND ELY

ARE THE ONLY COLLEGES, NOT OF WAR.

ABOVE THEM THERE ARE DISPLAYS OF RADIANT WHORES

CLIMBING OUT OF THE TOMBS' BATH-HOUSE

TO THE HOUSE OF BLINDNESS AND A DIMPLED MOON.

HERE AVIGDOR HA-SARFATI AND THE VENERABLE RABBI ISAAC

TAKE THE LOAF OF BREAD THAT WAS SET ASIDE

AND HALVE IT TWICE. SPEAKING IN A COMMON VOICE

THEY TELL US NOT TO FEAR THAT SICKNESS IN THE CHEST

FOR IT IS JUST THIS SICKNESS THAT WILL HEAL US.

STUDY THE MOUTH OF THE TET, THE ANGRY

UNSAYABLES OF THE PE. A THIN LINE OF CAMELS

ACROSS THE PLAIN OF BEZIERS WHERE THE RAGS

OF A GREAT SCARECROW ARE BURNING IN PARALLAX: 4 olin;

'ma' amarot of ten circles;

and a gold beard with fifty-two knots.

                                                                  SPIRIT TABLETS

LIKE SEWER PLATES IN LOS ANGELES.

IN OUR BRIGHTENING SUN?

A WATER MONSTER WITH HIS BOWL OF LIGHTNING

SHOUTS, SHOUTS FOR THE COUSINS OF LO.

THE WHITE LAMA IS OTRUL CHAK OF THE EASTERN GATE

WHO MOVES CLOCKWISE WITH US

ENTERING THE STARK SUNLIGHT OF ÖPAME. THE LU

OF THE 'A-MOUNTAIN' CRYING

NOT TO HURT THE MOUNTAIN. YET THEY WILL.

IT IS NOW ALL IN BEAUTY THAT THEY ARE DEAD.

AGAVE GROWING AROUND THE RUIN OF A LADDER

AND THE SIMPLE FLOURSACK MASK OF 'TALKING GOD'

ASKS THEM TO BE CALM

FOR THEY WERE TOLD IN A FIELD OF SNOW

THAT THEY MUST NOT HURT

THE STUPAS GREAT SKIRTS OF FELDSPAR.

'ONCE JUST TO WALK ON THE LAND

WAS TO DREAM.'

NOW A RAINBOW APPEARS IN THE SKY

AND THE CHILDREN WHO ARE BORN OF THE HORIZON

ARE BURYING THE RED TOOTH OF GEBURAH.

DZIDZIDZIDZIDZIDZIDZI

THREE INNOCENTS WITH LIME AND SALT BURYING

THE RED TRIANGLE PULLED LIKE A NAIL FROM THE TREE.

TSAK. TSAK. THE WOOD-BIRD YEAR.

AND THE BOATMAN CHATRAL SMILES AT THE TREE

WITH NOW THREE TEETH IN IT.

THERE'S A GIANT BLACK PLUM

TURNING AMONG LARCHES ON A HIGH CLIFF,

AND WE SHALL WORSHIP IT

IN BREEDING FITS OF SILENCE. ∞